Slashdot videos: Now with more Slashdot!

View

Discuss

Share

We've improved Slashdot's video section; now you can view our video interviews, product close-ups and site visits with all the usual Slashdot options to comment, share, etc. No more walled garden! It's a work in progress -- we hope you'll check it out (Learn more about the recent updates).

SharkLaser writes "In a leaked letter sent to Spain's outgoing President, the US ambassador warned that if Spain didn't pass SOPA-like file-sharing site blocking law, Spain would risk being put into United States trade blocklist. United States government interference in Spain's intellectual property laws have been suspected for a long time, and now the recent leaks of diplomatic cables confirm this. Apart from the cables leaked earlier, now another cable dated December 12th says U.S. expresses 'deep concern' over the failure to implement SOPA-style censorship law in the country. 'The government has unfortunately failed to finish the job for political reasons, to the detriment of the reputation and economy of Spain,' read the letter. Racing against the clock in the final days of the government, Solomont had one last push. 'I encourage the Government of Spain to implement the Sinde Law immediately to safeguard the reputation of Spain as an innovative country that does what it says it will, and as a country that breeds confidence,' he wrote."

Germany has twice as external debt than Spain, same the UK, France... even the US has much more external debt than Spain proportionally, in case you think the US is not bankrupt. Spain's problem is a very high rate of unemployement, their debt is relatively small. Amazed of how easy is to be absolutely misinformed nowadays.

Actually, you are wrong. Spain has a GDP foreign debt of 284% and Germany has a GDP foreign debt of 176%. The US have 101%, and they are in much better finantial shape than many strong countries in EU.
Spain also has a complex, almost non-regulated, mutualist banking system (Caixas), and very poor performance in the EU stress tests. The only reason Spain has no interest to the IMF/European Fund is because most of the foreign debt is held by Germany and the UK, and a rescue operation would imply much more money than what the European Fund had avaliable, and would cause a direct hit in both UK's and Germany's banking companies.
I used as reference the following infographic: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-15748696 [bbc.co.uk]

Actually, you are wrong. Spain has a GDP foreign debt of 284% and Germany has a GDP foreign debt of 176%. The US have 101%, and they are in much better finantial shape than many strong countries in EU.

The "Foreign debt to GDP" numbers reflects the relative size of the countries financial systems and should not be seen as liabilities as this debt is collateralized. The better numbers to compare for "financial shape" are the "Govt debt to GDP" levels, respectively 67%, 83% and 100%. Additionally one should look at the current account [wikipedia.org] for the countries in question. This shows a why Spain is in trouble even if its debt to GDP ratio is relatively small (67%).

Not really, the US represents a huge buyer of inexpensive cheap plastic crap from china and would devastate their economy if we stopped trading with them. The US would suffer because we would have to buy locally produced expensive cheap plastic crap, at least until we have had time to ramp up the cheap plastic crap industry at home and solve the unemployment problem.

Actually, China is one of the (non-american) biggest USA debt buyer, and their interest in american economy is quite simple to grasp - they need to keep the dollar strong,so they can make a ton of money by dollar-yuan exchanges, but keeping their international selling prices the same. As an added bonus, the commodities market also frequently trade in dollars, so it's a win-win situation.
In the day the dollar stops being a priority for the chinese, probably it won't worth the paper is printed on. A considerable devaluation of the currency would lead all those countries that also negotiate in dollars (officially or unofficially) to exchange them as fast as they can. Given the amount of forged currency in circulation, it would have a catastrophic effect - not only for the USA, but for every other 1st world country whose financial sector is backed by dollar investments.

That is like saying that a 4 ft tall person is the tallest person in a room full of midgets. The amount of US debt owned by China is only 8% of all US public debt. Their interest in the US economy is solely as a potential market to sell goods. And soon they won't even be worried about that as their middle class keeps growing. But right now the US is the larget market out there, with no real replacement.

China owns 8% of dollar. If they sold all their dollars, dollar would drop 8%.

Really? Is that the way it works? Sorry if I'm completely ignorant of the way this market works. Why would one large player completely selling out of the market only affect the price by the amount that player holds? I'm just asking because in just about any other market I've heard of, that kind of move would trigger a huge drop as other players struggle to be the first to abandon what they see as a sinking ship (even if their intention is just to sell high and then buy low later). Why would it be different in this market?

What he was doing (rightly or wrongly) was paraphrasing the old saying "When you owe the bank a thousand dollars, you have a problem, but when you owe the bank a million dollars, the bank has a problem."

Not really, the US represents a huge buyer of inexpensive cheap plastic crap from china and would devastate their economy if we stopped trading with them. The US would suffer because we would have to buy locally produced expensive cheap plastic crap, at least until we have had time to ramp up the cheap plastic crap industry at home and solve the unemployment problem.

China gets squat in exchange for the goods they ship to the US. The reason they continue is to keep their productive infrastructure operational and their people industrious. They could dump manufactured goods into the sea and be no worse off.

As for being blacklisted by the Americans... the US got where they are on the basis of trade. The reason they got that way is because people who trade with them usually end up getting the short end of the stick. This being the case, any rational person would see that doing business with the US is a bad idea. This isn't a secret. It's not even a controversial statement. The problem is, Americans are extremely good at corrupting representatives into screwing over those they represent by continuing to do business with them.

what makes you think this doesn't apply to any trade blacklist globally?

The market is no longer "us centric", so any trade blacklist just makes it worse for us. Who would do business by choice with a country that is blacklisting (and blackmailing) countries into being the same kind of failure they are becoming?

This is what I'm hoping for. The rest of the world finally says "enough" and puts the U.S. on a trade blacklist. We face the possibility of 100 million deaths because we don't produce any food anymore. We go to war to secure stations in food-producing countries. Both the EU and China join forces to stop us. The U.S. military is completely destroyed. The U.S. signs treaties. We go back to a "normal" country again and start putting money into infrastructure and education instead of bombing the shit out of the backwoods tiny nation du jour.

Other nations you may have heard of that are already on this list include: Canada, India, Israel, and Pakistan.
Being named in this list, as the ambassador suggested might happen to Spain, does not mean that the U.S. is starting some kind of trade blockade or economic war with Spain.

Does the Sinde law sound bad? Yes. But the ultimate responsibility and/or blame lies with the Spanish government. Insinuating that the only reason the law was created and passed is that the U.S. threatened Spain with an act of war is silly hyperbole.

I really don't get this - is SOPA so important to US interests that it would risk a trade war with an EU country? I get that it's in the interests of some media companies, but they are puny in comparison with other US industries. Don't these industries have lobbies, too?

1. SOPA is so important to U.S. corporate interests that they are exerting enormous pressure on our Legislature.

2. Our Legislature, being so dependent on corporate insider trading, is willing to do their will.

3. Our Executive branch, being utterly bereft of ethical standards, is willing to threaten Spain with actual economic damages for no more reason than to support U.S. corporate interests, which uktimately serve to enrich the Legislature (and other insiders) to the disadvantage of the general population.

4. There are virtually NO U.S. corporations that would not benefit from the enactment of SOPA, in some way. Virtually none would suffer any damages from enactment of SOPA. Even Internet-based corporations would benefit from having clear rules to follow. Ambiguity is not always profitable.

4. There are virtually NO U.S. corporations that would not benefit from the enactment of SOPA, in some way. Virtually none would suffer any damages from enactment of SOPA. Even Internet-based corporations would benefit from having clear rules to follow. Ambiguity is not always profitable.

This is just ridiculous. First of all, what about the existing law is supposed to be so ambiguous? New laws almost always produce more ambiguity because there has to be a period of years before the courts have a chance to write decisions interpreting them where any number of the new provisions remain uncertain. This is especially true of SOPA because parts of it are so obviously subject to a constitutional challenge, which means companies won't know whether they have to follow them until it goes to court -- which is the worst kind of uncertainty; the kind that leads to expensive protracted litigation.

I think you'll find that the US Trade Representative's positions are set not based on what US companies want, but rather based on what US companies that do the most lobbying want. The RIAA and MPAA have long been prolific in their employment of lobbyists; tech companies less so until very recently and even there they lack the sort of experience necessary to be as effective as would be expected from their size and economic importance. One can hope that they get it right before it's too late, but I prefer to hope that Americans come to their senses and make it a defense to murder that the victim was an entertainment/fossil fuel/defense/telecommunications industry lobbyist.

My friend, you are sorely mistaken if you think that money is the only card on the table in the SOPA debate. If it was only about money, Google and Facebook would lobby the **AA's into oblivion, as their pockets are so much deeper that it wouldn't even be a contest. SOPA is not even about copyright; it's about control. By writing such an overly broad rule, the government assures that all sites on the web are in violation of the law at all times. While the vast majority of sites would be assumed to be acting in good faith to prevent infringement, anyone who steps out of line can immediately be wiped out with no due process. Wikileaks and the Occupy movement have showed the Congress critters that an unregulated Internet will eventually bring all of their greed and corruption into the light of day, and that people will only tolerate it for so long. They NEED something like SOPA to reign it back and, so that they can continue fucking the people without worry of being taken to task for it.

Exactly. Let's not forget how Allison Halataei and Lauren Pastarnak whored themselves out to the RIAA/MPAA straight out of Lamar Smith's office. No waiting period to dispel any appearance of impropriety. They know it doesn't matter, just follow the money because the corruption is so ingrained.

Your question reminds me of the old joke about the guy asking the lady in a bar, "Would you sleep with me for a billion dollars?" to which she says "Yes"; then he asks "For a hundred?" and she responds "What kind of lady do you think I am?"; his answer: "We've already determined that. Now we're negotiating the price."

I've been reading more about SOPA recently, and the list of opponents is actually relatively small. Most of them are internet-based service companies, without tangible products. Google's the biggest of the bunch, followed by Amazon, Ebay, Yahoo, and AOL. Everyone else is tiny--miniscule even--compared to the list of SOPA supporters.

On the other hand, everybody from cosmetics to media support SOPA. Every industry that involves a tangible product has at least one company or lobbying group within it supporting SOPA.

Tech giants like Microsoft and Apple are staying quiet, though I suspect the BSA's stated reservations are close to their official position. Collectively, they're neutral at best.

But everyone else is in favor of SOPA. Everyone. Except the ones whom the government is supposed to represent.

4. There are virtually NO U.S. corporations that would not benefit from the enactment of SOPA, in some way. Virtually none would suffer any damages from enactment of SOPA. Even Internet-based corporations would benefit from having clear rules to follow. Ambiguity is not always profitable.

3.5% of the US GDP is media, in the broadest sense. The other 96.5% benefits from an unrestricted Internet. "Having clear rules to follow" means having to hire people and build systems to enact those rules.

SOPA will be as costly to US corporations as the DMCA was. it's a giant extra bit of friction that only helps a tiny corner of the economy. Either you know nothing about economics or you are a shill.

I think SarbOx may be a better comparison (or perhaps just a more widely known comparison)... I remember lots of wailing and gnashing of teeth at the expense of adjusting to Sarbanes-Oxley requirements, but not so many for DCMA.

I am far from being a republican, but I would likely vote for Ron Paul. He may be a loon, but he has been consistent and has shown a degree of moral aptitude, while other politicians pander to corporate interest. The Republican party has toted the line of less government influence for 100-years, yet, where are we? There have been as many Republican controlled justices, congressmen, and presidents, if not more, than Democratic ones.

Exactly, because the only options one would have is to sue the government or some multi-billion dollar corporation. Neither is economically feasible to anyone that is not a government or multi-billion dollar corporation themselves, so in effect, no one else has any rights at all regarding this.

The assholes in government and corporate America would love nothing better than for all of us to shut the fuck up, come out and vote for the guy they tell us to every couple years, and buy their price-inflated shit o

There is a difference between US companies individually saying "we dont like how spain doesnt support SOPA, we wont do our business there", which your analogy would be like, and the US imposing nationwide sanctions on trading with spain.

Coercion [wikipedia.org]: Coercion is the practice of forcing another party to behave in an involuntary manner (whether through action or inaction) by use of threats or intimidation or some other form of pressure or force. In law, coercion is codified as the duress crime. Such actions are used as leverage, to force the victim to act in the desired way. Coercion may involve the actual infliction of physical pain/injury or psychological harm in order to enhance the credibility of

As of now, it is easy to sit back and monitor connections, because people will do their business directly from their IP addresses.

Come SOPA, there will be a distributed, encrypted name system, and more people will move to offshore proxies. This will completely lock out passive spying, forcing LEOs to have to take an active role, either by blocking proxies by IP address, demanding endpoints have monitoring on them, or passing harsh, unenforceable laws, and then vacuuming up a script kiddy to throw a life sentence at as an example.

SOPA will just get P2P people to have to download an updated client. Law enforcement will be stuck out in the cold when all connections go dark as people start using VPNs as a matter of routine.

99% of the population would not understand what you are talking about. Yes, people will wind up updating their clients to get some sort of encryption which will be traceable back to their IP.

I can tell you if I ask teenagers today most won't even know what a VPN is.

It will affect casual piracy as people are thrown in jail to make an example. Hardcore pirates will use workarounds such as VPNs. The average Joe won't and will see people being thrown in jail and stop.

There's actual tangible value in piracy, it's not just a convenience feature of the internet. Robbing banks is illegal and they have spent hundreds of millions in securing them in that industry, but guess what I hear on the news a few months ago? Yep, bank STILL got robbed.

I imagine a serious increase in wifi hacking and a lot of misdirected finger pointing.

You miss one point - it's possible to make more sophisticated P2P programs.

I don't (personally) want to get involved in it due to prevalence of child porn, but tru darknets like freenet start to look more appealing.

It would also be perfectly possible to set up an encrypted multi-bounce net that connects friends to each other to share data. Direct connections need go no further than friends-of-friends, each one trusted because a direct friend has signed for them. Each person shares a list of media they can 'see' with their connections, the kevin-bacon effect ensures that the net eventually encompasses a whole heap of people who can now trade data across the world but appear only to be connected to local folks.

Traffic disguising algorithms like those used by WASTE can hide or at least randomise a lot of traffic and... well. There are attempts in this direction already with projects like OneSwarm.

And as pipes get faster all the time this sort of thing just gets more feasible.

That 99% of the population will just go to the 1% that knows how to pirate shit. The cat and mouse game will continue. There are already informal "clubs" springing up just to share media. As it is now, many people in our circle carry their huge external hard drives around with them everywhere they go, explicitly so we can share media with each other. I'm the music guy, another is the movie/tv guy, another is the windows software guy, then there's the Apple software guy...hell, I even know someone that has almost any ebook I would ever want, plus thousands of comic books in a variety of formats.

The irony in all of this is, they'll spend or otherwise forego billions of dollars fighting piracy when they could put that money into providing a better product with more value and sell more than they ever did. The RIAA has been fighting music piracy for over a decade and what did they gain? Nothing. How many billions did they waste?

Piracy is like the hydra, you cut off one head and two more grow in it's place. Wiping out Napster just moved everyone to Kazaa and Limewire. Fighting Limewire just moved everyone to P2P. Fighting P2P just moved everyone to digital locker sites, and SOPA will just move everyone to encrypt their traffic and give rise to the sneakernet once again, and the only way they're going to police that is to start searching people...and once that comes to pass the U.S. Government might as well start putting it's affairs in order, because it will not last long after that...

It looks, from this mini article [engadget.com] (since noone seems willing to link to either the letter, or the law), like its more akin to the DMCA takedown provision. A content holder feels like their content is being illegally shared, they pass that on to a commission which determines if the case is actionable; if so, that is passed onto a judge.

Which, to my mind, sounds about right. Im not clear on why the commission is necessary, except perhaps to weed out unnecessary cases; but regardless it sounds like the courts do get involved.

The questions is: Will the people living int he US finally elect a competent set of leaders, or will this worsening problem require an external solution? I guess another alternative would be a revolution? How many more years like this?

Lobbying is basically people banding together and expressing their opinion with promises of campaign money. Im not sure how you intend to get rid of that without curtailing people's right to vote, or to speech, or to the press.

I'm not sure what people you mean? Do the majority of voters band together to contribute money to campaigns?

No the majority uses (or fails to use) his/her vote. Don't you think the vote should constitute that? Why should the people have to explicitly pay to elect officials? Shouldn't that be part of how a democratic entity uses its funds?

The ones contributing money (at least the large bulk of it) are rich individuals or corporations which is why we see such large disparities between what people want and what corporations want.

Sometimes I wonder for how horrible it was how true Mutant Chronicles [imdb.com] corporate states will become.

This means that you force TV and the 'net to provide certain free services: specifically, access for candidates to air time and a certain amount of bandwidth for their websites. You force the ad placement companies to put political ads into their rotation. Then you make it illegal to give money to a candidate if you're a corporation, and cap individual contributions.

Of course, the Roberts court basically made this practically impossible at this point

With the amount of money that it takes to be a viable candidate for the office of the president of the United States, you can be sure that anyone you see on the ballot was bought and payed for long before you had any say in the matter. Couple this with the corporate collusion in media ownership to take care of 'outliers' (not that I agree with everything he says, but look at the time Ron Paul was given in debates in relation to his poll numbers), and you have a system where we really don't get a choice at all.

Yep I just wish the citizens of foreign nations would understand that. Short of a revolt democratic change is slow and uneventful.

And I fear because of our sheer geographic size and population disbursement (in that groups who share the same ideas/ideals are geographically disconnected) we would really never get a good hold on a proper revolt.

Even if you are the best willed person and set up the best government (or even company). At a later date it will become corrupt and will look not at all the people, but at some of the people. So even if you start a 0% evil it will evolved towards 100% evil.

Revolutions are there for a reason. They are there to do a reboot to 0% and the the whole process starts over again.

That's not a question, it's not like we get to actually choose who to vote for. It's like you coming over to my house for dinner and I offer you your choice of tripe or haggis. Which is the better choice?

The difference between the U.S. and China is that (for the time being) Americans are still allowed to talk about how they hate their government. Whether the system prevents them from doing anything is a different story, but we can at least talk.

Being a big bully is one thing. It's one thing if we're a big bully on things like human rights. What's more distressing to me is that we're basically allowing the media companies to push the US into being a big bully for things that even our own citizens think is ridiculous.

Being a big bully is one thing. It's one thing if we're a big bully on things like human rights. What's more distressing to me is that we're basically allowing the media companies to push the US into being a big bully for things that even our own citizens think is ridiculous.

Before the media companies there were other commercial interests that pushed the US government to do their bidding. Go back to 1893 and you'll find that sugar interests were responsible for Hawaii being taken over by the US. And that is just one example.

Being a big bully is one thing. It's one thing if we're a big bully on things like human rights. What's more distressing to me is that we're basically allowing the media companies to push the US into being a big bully for things that even our own citizens think is ridiculous.

Before the media companies there were other commercial interests that pushed the US government to do their bidding. Go back to 1893 and you'll find that sugar interests were responsible for Hawaii being taken over by the US. And that is just one example.

Yep. Not to mention all of the banana republics in South America, who had their approximately-democratic governments violently toppled by the CIA acting on behalf of American produce companies.

America has never been The Good Guy, it has just been a typical state out to get ahead at any cost... any cost, that is, short of allowing its citizens to discover that it is not The Good Guy.

That's why the diplomatic cable leaks are such a Big Deal, and the reason why Bradley Manning will get no popular sympathy. His revelations cause American citizens to feel cognitive dissonance ("We aren't the Good Guy? Really?")... and people deeply hate those who cause them cognitive dissonance.

I'm an American citizen and I feel ashamed about the degree to which my country has fallen to regulatory capture.

America was one of the Good Guys circa 1941-1945. And even that is debatable. I'm not gonna argue about whether or not the nukes were necessary (I think they probably were), but you don't get to be called a Good Guy for using them.

Wait... you mean we are the baddies?
That must explain the skulls on our hats.

For anyone not familiar with the paraphrased quote above, I *highly* recommend you watch the source of the quote, this short clip [youtube.com] from That Mitchell and Webb Look, one of the funnier British comedy duos of recent years.

For a good example of that look at US "foreign policy" on Latin America on the 20th century. We've been a playground of tactics, social and not so social experiments, etc... School of americas used some of the French guys that had tortured people in Algeria as teachers for latin american army officers. Those army officers went on to run the dictatorships that kidnapped/killed thousands.
It seems US citizens are now questioning the basic goodness of their government. We stopped believing in it decades ago.

I'm really hoping that Google, Facebook, etc. pursue the "nuclear option" that has been discussed. It will kill SOPA almost instantly, making SOPA politically untouchable. It will also serve as a wakeup call to politicians that they were meant to serve the people, not lobbyists.

At this point, we'll have serious egg on our face for implying that another country is a "bad country" because their politicians didn't want to commit political suicide.

USA only seems like a bigger bully because it has bigger economic muscles. You can see France and Germany throwing their economic weight around to the detriment of smaller EU neighbors. You see China throwing its economic weight around to the detriment of the SEA neighbors. You see Russia throwing its economic weight around to the detriment of its former satellites. Yet these other bullies are rarely the focus of internet moralists, many of whom live in or are more affected by their proximity to those count

NDAA says you are a thread to the country, citizen or not, and can now be detained indefinitely. And no one is going to be able to counter the massive firepower, including automated drones, to make this happen.

Maybe 11 years ago it might have been remotely possible, but the republic is here to stay until people start starving in the streets (no citizens to tax) or another country takes over violently.

I am so fucking tired of hearing how America is bullying the world into being forced into implementing legislation that is utterly flawed and is only there to serve the interests of the *AAs.

America can go fuck themselves if this is the best they've got.

Things like fair use are legal rights in other countries, but the USA is working to be sure that we all have the same lowest common denominator -- them.

I think someone should start passing laws holding the US accountable for the financial melt-down they caused, and for charging them for the implementation of the laws they've been ramming down everyone else's throats.

America has become a bunch of pathetic, whining cowards who are only worried about copyright, and making sure they can buy cheap oil.

Part of the US politician's plans is making the public lazy and complacent. It's working. In general, the USA population is getting dumber, lazier and fatter. Good luck getting all those dumb lazy people to get up off the couch and do anything about their failing country. You all know it's the truth

Powerless? You are not.
Come back and tell me that after you get a big chunk of population marching on the streets and getting shot for it. In Syria people are powerless. So the government officials you guys elected don't act like they should?? Mass protest / strike till they are out of office. Until you try such things and fail you ARE NOT POWERLESS.

No, you're right. The people are not being shot in the streets in America. They are having chemical weapons, banned under the Geneva convention, deployed against them at peaceful protests. That's much better.

Speaking as someone who was pepper-sprayed, beaten, and detained for a legal, peaceful demonstration, I'd say we've got a few problems here.

First I'm an American, I live in the US always have. I'm am just fed up with my government. How in the hell can they be so disconnected, and how in the hell do they expect to impose their will on other nations. Fucking hell isn't that what the initial settlers came over here to get away from?

I find it so ironic that the USA is threatening a country that essentially found this side of the planet (admittedly, there were already people living here, but those indigenous populations are usually ignored by history books).

Secondly, exactly what items from Spain will stop being in Walmart if a trade embargo goes into place? And with "globalization", all Spain has to do is ship via a third party in a preferred trading partner status, like China or Canada.

And lastly, America is a failing empire. Apart from having a big military that they are borrowing heavily from the Chinese to pay for, they are no longer a threat. Rome lasted much, much longer, and was managed far better than the USA. A shame really.

Actually, thanks to Wikileaks we now know that the head of PROMUSICAE (the RIAA-equivalent in Spain), Guisasola, secretly pushed for having Spain included in the infamous 301 List. http://cablesearch.org/cable/view.php?id=10MADRID179 [cablesearch.org]After Spain was finally included in that list, he claimed that being included in that list was "a national dishonor", and used this argument in order to push for Ley Sinde, the aforementioned SOPA-like law.

Only a few days ago, this law was finally passed. Most Internet users are against this law because it does not change which sites become illegal - it merely changes the *referee*. As a result, judges have been replaced by a commission whose members are privately selected by private lobbying parties (aka spain's RIAA). This might sound like something outrageous, but sadly this is exactly what has happened.If this was not bad enough, keep in mind that this occurs right after *years* of judges ruling *in favor* of those websites that they want to take down (no hosting sites, just linking sites)

More outrageous details: they carefully worded the law so that there are two judges involved in the process of closing a web page. And all they do is checking the paperwork is correctly done, not if the page should be closed or not!! Go figure... any web page the commission says is against someone's intellectual property will be closed in a hat's drop, and only after a pair of years fighting in the courts it will be ruled if the web page should come back or not. A pair of years, literally!! That's way too much for someone's starting a new bussiness on the net. This law is just a workarround since the judges in Spain where issuing "not guilty" to every filesharing case, since in spanish law filesharing was legal as long as you wasn't making money in the process.

And worst of all, there are so many fires in Spain right now, there's literally not enough people to fight back, because they are fighting back too many problems at the same time! Did you know Spain's health care system was universal and free as in beer (read paid through taxes), and they are trying to turn it into USA style private health care system? And that's just the iceberg tip...

From the meetings I've seen, they could be genuinely clueless and taking the word of someone who has enough money to take them out to lunch. Anti-SOPA people don't have connected lobbyists. Plus, the pols are proud of their ignorance and sneered at the experts who said this was a bad thing.

Politicians are always dirty, this is no exception. And they need to be shamed every time they do something stupid. But blaming it on straight up bribery is missing important points about the many ways Congress is dys

For everyone normally making fun of the tinfoil hat crowd, we have here nothing short of concrete proof of a vast (global?) intergovernmental conspiracy by the oligarchy to fuck... us... all.

We've discussed the technical merits (or lack thereof) of SOPA here on Slashdot numerous times, and always, the inescapable conclusion came out that we simply had Luddites and idiots for leaders. Now, we have a better, more accurate answer. Our leaders may still count as idiots, but they fully realize just how deliberately-bad a law they've crafted in SOPA.

Can you hear the drums in the distance, getting ever closer, Washington?

We're the insensitive clods:-(. I find this so embarrassing - SOPA has like 15% public support and we're pushing it on other countries? *sigh* The worst part is that even though we can vote in new politicians, our electorate is completely broken; and I have no idea how to fix that...

If piracy had disappeared altogether, though, Spanish album sales would still be at an all-time low. Unemployment is over 20% and salaries for everyone else have gone down, so it's hardly surprising that spending on non-essentials is at an all time low. In particuar, unemployment amongst the young (who are probably the people who buy the most albums) is around 40%. Piracy has very little to do with it.

Pirated games and movies don't affect me, either. Does that mean I should shrug my shoulders and go "that's cute"? Fact is, while we should be concerned about copyright laws, it is YOU who should be MORE afraid of a country willing to censor "political stuff" You are only able to enjoy the life of an ex-pat because you have the luxury of leaving China whenever the politics do start to affect you.

We didn't. But I see lots of comments here about the US being a bully. The problem (here) is not that the US is a bully, which isn't new, but that the Spanish government caved.
Also, to add some relevant info, this law was written with the previous government (changed last month) but passed by the new one. And this is a two party country (for being in power purposes I mean, there's lots of parties but doesn't matter much here). So you can see that we are fucked here.
Anyway - we do have a tendency to pass